Erica Gajewski

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Erica Gajewski is a Canadian visual artist engaged with issues of biodiversity loss, ecological
resilience, environmental restoration, human and other animal relations, and socio-ecological systems. She is presently working toward a Ph.D. in Environmental Studies
at York University in Toronto, Canada. Her practice-based interdisciplinary research merges areas
of Animal Studies, Environment and Cultural Studies, and Visual Arts, to
investigate links between animal representation, species loss,
environmental degradation and resurgence.

In 2017, as part of her doctoral work, she started Farm Project, about an hour and a half from the city of Toronto. The farm provides a space to examine and reimagine human and other animal relations and flourishing. Previous material work has focused on concepts of time, absence/loss, presence, and representations of lived experiences with other animals. She combines artwork, research, education, and academic
discourse with lived experiences to facilitate greater thought, awareness, respect, and consideration
for the lives other animals, our shared environments and mutually joint futures.

Erica Ann Gajewski was born in Oshawa Ontario, where her interest in sports led to two Ontario provincial soccer championships and Canadian national silver medal, one Ontario provincial running championship, and later, a full athletic scholarship to the Savannah College of Art and Design, in Savannah, GA. She earned her B.F.A and M.F.A degrees while competing in soccer and cross-country running, captaining the running team her senior year and later coaching, as a graduate assistant coach, both the men’s and women’s running teams. Her soccer team was ranked as high as 21st in the U.S. and she placed 12th regionally as a runner in the Florida Sun Conference while holding an All-American Academic tittle. When not working she can be found running or relaxing with her two and four legged friends.